What is the difference between agate and chalcedony?

Agate and chalcedony are both well-known to everyone. In fact, the essence of both of them is minerals. In fact, there are many types of chalcedony minerals, and agate is one of them. The jewelry made of agate is very expensive, but it also attracts a lot of consumers. Whether it is agate or chalcedony, there are many colors, but in the future everyone must learn to distinguish between these two minerals.

The difference between agate and chalcedony:

Stripes: Agate is a medium-to-low-grade jade raw material with an cryptocrystalline structure (that is, the crystal particles cannot be seen), obvious banded stripes, and a glassy luster, which makes it very easy to distinguish. What needs to be noted is the difference between agate and chalcedony. Agate is cryptocrystalline, has obvious banded texture, and glassy luster, while chalcedony is microcrystalline, has no banded texture, and has a glassy to oily luster.

The difference between chalcedony and agate lies in whether it has banded patterns. Strictly speaking, there are no features of banding. It can only be called "chalcedony" and cannot be called agate. But in today's market, some chalcedony without stripes and patterns is also regarded as "agate", which is inconsistent with the meaning of agate in ancient times. Many of the chalcedony are jade raw materials, which are divided into: red chalcedony (also known as Inca stone), green chalcedony, blood chalcedony (also known as bloodstone) and jasper (formerly known as jasper) due to their different colors.

Color: Agate can be divided into the following varieties according to its morphological characteristics: onyx (divided into twisted agate and cut agate), red onyx, moss agate (also known as dendritic agate), landscape agate (also known as walled city agate), fire agate, and water-filled agate. The famous Nanjing "Yuhua Stone" is a type of agate with a concentric pattern structure. The evaluation and selection factors of agate are color, transparency and size. The process requirements are bright and pure colors, thick color layers; smooth surface, high transparency; uniform and clear patterns, good linearity; fine and tough texture; no cracks or few cracks; large block size. Red and blue are best.

Varieties of chalcedony: green chalcedony (also known as Australian jade, also known as Inka stone in China), dark green chalcedony, jasper, blood chalcedony (also known as chicken blood stone), etc. The color of chalcedony is pure and beautiful, and the larger the piece, the better. The high-quality green chalcedony and green chalcedony are the most precious. Chalcedony is mostly processed into ring faces, bracelets, necklaces and other jewelry.

Agate and chalcedony can be distinguished by their colors, bands, and other patterns. Chalcedony products are easily confused with aventurine, jadeite, jasper, etc., and can be distinguished based on differences in color, texture, density, etc. Chalcedony products are shiny, cryptocrystalline and have a fine texture. Quartzites such as aventurine have coarse grains, fine-grained structure and relatively rough texture. Jades similar to green chalcedony include green jadeite, turquoise, and amazonite. Green jadeite has a porphyritic interwoven structure, in which porphyritic or fibrous jadeite crystals can be seen. Turquoise has poor transparency, porcelain luster, and low hardness of 5-6. Amazonite has obvious lattice stripes.